Pallbearer

[milo]

V. 3 (props to Angel, ella, pinsir, and milo)

Carrying you
down the church
steps to pealing bells,
I thought myself a father
again, taking a daughter up
to bed over his shoulder, turning
off the light and shutting her pine door,
waiting to share breakfast at a long, crowded table.

I am back and forth on "long", is it really worth adding it for the double modification (I think i see the significance though i could be wrong).

One of my biggest complaints (and I have many) with "shape" poems is that they usually cause terrible line breaks. For the most part you have evaded that here with the possible exception of "up". This made me question the value of "up" at all (it doesn't really add much) which makes me think that "carrying" would have been a better word than "taking" (carrying a daughter to bed seems to imply up fine) but then, of course, you have already used carrying at the beginning of the poem which makes me look at that and i wonder if you considered something else for that first word.

Anyway, I am just letting my OCD get carried away here and I probably shouldn't drag others down my path of mania. For the most part I think this reads pretty good.

(not that i think it would be better but i would almost like to see "closing" instead of 'shutting" for a bit just to compare the 2.)